On Magic Pills Or Lack Thereof

Generally speaking, there is no magic pill to lose weight. Instead, weight loss is inevitably tied to one thing: calories in to calories out. No more. No less. That said, I’ve been trying to lose the same five pounds for the last five years, if you know what I mean.

So when you hear the success of “The Cookie Congregation” and the amazing amount of weight those on it have been able to lose—and keep off—you understand the magnitude of the accomplishment, all without surgery.

In fact, I’ve often wondered what if a patient receiving bariatric surgery was wheeled into the operating room believing they were going to have the surgery, but doctors didn’t give it. Instead, acting as if they had, the patient (as is generally done) is provided with the list of foods they could and could not eat because of the changes made to their stomach during the surgery.

What most people frequently forget is that it’s not the surgery that produces the weight loss, it’s how they’re forced to eat afterwards to accommodate their surgically reduced stomach and I’ve often thought, spare yourself the pain and cost, and just eat right. But I do understand that it’s never that simple.

Back to our cover story on the “Cookie Congregation”, their secret is hardly magic, it is prayer, —the power of which has been both debated and heralded down through time. But there is no debating the results attributed to the spiritual dimension the program incorporates through it’s association with churches and tapping into their core support of each other and their pastors as they endeavor to beat the scale.

I’ve tasted both the cookies and the smoothies and I am a fan of the Berry Crème smoothie. But this is as much a successful business profile forged by two men—a pastor and a Beverly Hills entrepreneur—whose story is just as interesting as the diet they’ve helped to forge. Check out their story beginning on page 10.

Getting back to that magic pill, I wish there was one to eradicate the racism that has permeated our society and headlines over the past month, what with the Shirley Sherrod debacle, the Tea Party clash with the NAACP and the assertion by some in the press that President Barack Obama wasn’t black enough.

Then again, when it comes to race, I am a realist. Racism, sexism and a whole lot of other isms, I believe, will always be with us and we’re not perfect people—none of us. The key is not to let them define us.

America has had a great many teachable moments on race, but Shirley Sherrod was not one of them. Hers was a story of distorted information and people who didn’t check sources, didn’t listen to the context in which a seemingly controversial statement was being made; and the knee-jerk and politically inspired actions that followed. It was sloppy journalism and a rush to judgment—all done in very poor taste and in short order.

But the latest debate on race may still be growing with news that the Office of Congressional Ethics, the watchdog group established by House Majority Leader Nancy Pelosi, has turned its attention on another member of the Congressional Black Caucus.

The latest target: Congresswoman Maxine Waters, one of the most outspoken black Democrats in Congress, now reportedly accused of assisting One United, a Boston-based Black-owned bank (on whose board her husband served) in getting federal bailout money.

This on the heels of news of a deal made by New York Democrat Rep. Charles Rangel (D-NY), who was to face an ethics trial this fall on 13 charges including nonpayment of taxes, legislative favors for donors to a college center named after him and omitting hundreds of thousands of dollars of income and assets on disclosure statements.

“Irrespective if the accusations of unethical practices are true or not,” Atlanta Post columnist Charing Ball wrote, “one could legitimately argue that when it comes to ethics in Congress, there might be a higher level of scrutiny and accountability, when ethnicity comes into play. And much like the judicial system that we common folk must face, the level of discretion by the Ethics Committee, which is made up of both Democrats and Republicans, between the CBC and their white congressional counterparts are often unequally applied.”

Other members of the Congressional Black Caucus reportedly on the radar of the Ethic Committee include Laura Richardson (D-CA), Donald Payne (D-N.J.) and Jesse Jackson Jr. (D-Ill).

“To be clear”, wrote Ball, “I am in no way making excuses or suggesting that Rangel, Waters or any member of the CBC receive a pass for their transgressions. And when it comes to corruption in Washington, I believed that the angry ethics mob, wielding the moral pitchforks, should be swung in any and all directions, regardless of race. But when out of the 30 investigation levied by the Congressional Ethic Committee only yields three members of the Congressional Black Caucus, it’s only logical to conclude that race is a factor.”

Here we go again…